Oakland County helps out during Macomb's IT emergency

The neighborhood courtesy that starts with borrowing a cup of sugar doesnít stop at the edge of the block or subdivision.

Nearby cities for years have borrowed the occasional leaf collector, garbage truck or sewer vacuum.

Neighboring Oakland and Macomb counties took common courtesy to an interesting new level after an electrical fire April 17 at the 13-story old Macomb County Building took out much of the countyís data and communications services. The fire was caused by water leaking into electrical equipment, eventually disabling the buildingís mainframe computers as well as electricity.

Oakland County loaned space at its data center in Pontiac and had IT staff working around the clock alongside their Macomb County counterparts to establish a temporary backup system where all of Macombís data was successfully saved.

It helped enormously that Macombís new information technology director, Sandy Jurek, held that post in Oakland County for a decade and is familiar with equipment and capabilities in both counties.

Macomb will maintain a data site in Oakland for a few more weeks, using borrowed equipment. The many hours Oakland employees spent working on the problems was essentially a gift from County Executive L. Brooks Patterson.

In an earlier age, a fire might have meant the irretrievable loss of crucial paper records, or in more recent years, irreplaceable records from computers without adequate backup. Itís good that modern information technology makes such a loss virtually unthinkable and, as Macomb County has shown, nearly impossible.

The old building was grandfathered out of building and fire codes, including a fire suppression system. It was to be retained as a backup location for computer services while the department and equipment moved to a new communications center toward the end of the year.

As we pointed out, neighborly assistance among communities isnít new. While much of it is the municipal equivalent of borrowing a cup of sugar, some of it is contractual: Mutual aid pacts bind fire departments in some groups of communities or public safety departments in others to come to one anotherís aid in the event of a large fire or hazardous material incident.

Patterson, acknowledging his staff was trying to put Macombís systems back in operation as quickly as possible, added, ďIím sure they would do the same thing for us.Ē

ďItís what neighbors do.ĒAnd in doing, they help bind their neighborhood together.